The nerve impulse is characterised by a great influx of sodium ions through channels in the neuron's cell membrane followed by an efflux of potassium ions through other channels. The neuron is unable to fire again for a short time (known as the refractory period), which is mediated by another potassium channel. The flow through these ion channels is governed by a "gate" which is opened by either a voltage change or a chemical messenger known as a ligand (such as a neurotransmitter). These channels are another target for anticonvulsant drugs.[7]
Beware of added sugars or high-glycemic sweeteners in spice blends or condiments, but other than that, it’s fair game for keto. In spice-heavy dishes, carbs can add up, but don’t drive yourself crazy worrying about your teaspoon of turmeric. Check labels for additives like sugars, milk solids, potato starch, corn starch, or MSG, or make your own blends at home. Table salt often contains undisclosed fillers and anti-caking agents, so it’s best to opt for sea salt or Himalayan pink salt instead.

Nina, this is a brilliant article, thank you. I have shared it with my Low Carb & Keto Facebook US & UK groups, many of whom are new to this way of eating for weight loss, reversing Diabetes, preventing Diabetes and improving their health. My members receive regular low carb recipes and support but articles like this, really do reinforce their reasons for staying low carb and helps them justify their lifestyle to family, friends and some Medics!

No animal on earth lives permanently in ketosis. Omnivorous animals such as bears and dogs, and obligate carnivores such as cats – the ultimate low-carbers – use gluconeogenesis to transform amino acids from protein into glucose[1]. This allows them to maintain optimal blood glucose levels to fulfill their bodies’ needs for this vital nutrient. Only in prolonged starvation or a diabetic state will these animals enter ketosis.
OMG! I have a household of 9. 3 of us are Keto. EVERYONE in the house asks for this recipe on the regular! I add a little heavy cream into the ground beef with the cream cheese and make the recipe for 16 servings (have dad, hubby and 18 yo son in the house.) I like to carmalize the onion and garlic in bacon grease as well. This recipe is an easy “go to” that pleases anyone in the house as well as a great idea when we have extra company. This is probably our favorite keto recipe to date!
If you’ve decided to move forward in trying the keto diet, you will want to stick to the parameters of the eating plan. Roughly 60 to 80 percent of your calories will come from fats. That means you’ll eat meats, fats, and oils, and a very limited amount of nonstarchy vegetables, she says. (This is different from a traditional low-carb diet, as even fewer carbs are allowed on the keto diet.)
The ketogenic diet is an advanced nutritional approach that improves fat burning, preserves lean body tissue and improves brain function. The Ketogenic diet also starves cancer cells of their preferred fuel source (sugar) and allows our immune system to function at it peak. This book goes over all the details and challenges involved with the Ketogenic diet in order to turn your body into a lean, mean fat burning machine. You will find invaluable information in this 10 chapter E-guide that will help you break through challenges you have experienced in the past with the ketogenic diet.
The ketogenic diet may seem like the latest weight-loss craze, but it’s actually been around for nearly a century. Developed in the 1920s, this ultra-low-carb, high-fat eating plan was originally used to treat seizures in people with epilepsy. Today, it’s getting some serious attention for an entirely different reason. “There’s growing research showing that the ketogenic diet is effective for managing blood sugar in people with diabetes,” says William Yancy, MD, program director at the Duke Diet and Fitness Center in Durham, North Carolina. “However, because we don’t have studies [lasting] longer than two or three years, we don’t know what can happen with regard to complications over longer periods of time.”

First reported in 2003, the idea of using a form of the Atkins diet to treat epilepsy came about after parents and patients discovered that the induction phase of the Atkins diet controlled seizures. The ketogenic diet team at Johns Hopkins Hospital modified the Atkins diet by removing the aim of achieving weight loss, extending the induction phase indefinitely, and specifically encouraging fat consumption. Compared with the ketogenic diet, the modified Atkins diet (MAD) places no limit on calories or protein, and the lower overall ketogenic ratio (about 1:1) does not need to be consistently maintained by all meals of the day. The MAD does not begin with a fast or with a stay in hospital and requires less dietitian support than the ketogenic diet. Carbohydrates are initially limited to 10 g per day in children or 20 g per day in adults, and are increased to 20–30 g per day after a month or so, depending on the effect on seizure control or tolerance of the restrictions. Like the ketogenic diet, the MAD requires vitamin and mineral supplements and children are carefully and periodically monitored at outpatient clinics.[48]

A short-lived increase in seizure frequency may occur during illness or if ketone levels fluctuate. The diet may be modified if seizure frequency remains high, or the child is losing weight.[19] Loss of seizure-control may come from unexpected sources. Even "sugar-free" food can contain carbohydrates such as maltodextrin, sorbitol, starch, and fructose. The sorbitol content of suntan lotion and other skincare products may be high enough for some to be absorbed through the skin and thus negate ketosis.[31]
This is one area where full keto and Bulletproof differ. Except for coconut, all nuts and legumes are suspect on the Bulletproof Diet and should be limited. All expose you to high amounts of omega-6s, inflammatory oxidized fats, mold toxins, and phytates (plant anti-nutrients). Peanuts are one of the main sources of mold toxins in our diets, and often trigger allergic responses with inflammatory polyunsaturated fats, lectins and histamines. The Bulletproof Diet also excludes all soy products due to their phytoestrogen content, which messes with your hormones and may promote cancer.
Missing Nutrients. One of the biggest concerns for dietitians is the keto diet’s lack of key foods. Many question the eating plan’s impact on the development of certain chronic diseases. Without milk, for example, getting enough calcium and vitamin D for sturdy bones becomes a challenge. Take away whole grains, fruit, beans, and potatoes, and it’s nearly impossible to consume enough potassium for healthy blood pressure or enough fiber to stay regular. And unless you’re eating lots of low-carb, leafy green vegetables, you miss out on vitamins A, C, K, and folate, too.
The backbone of a keto plan is its extraordinarily high fat content, making up 65 to 80 percent of calories daily. Protein—which can raise blood glucose, though not as much as carbohydrate does—makes up 15 to 25 percent of calories on the keto diet. And carbs are even more heavily restricted to just 5 to 15 percent of calories. That’s only about 20 to 50 grams a day (compared with the average 245 grams daily), or the amount in a small apple or a cup of cooked brown rice, respectively.
The low glycaemic index treatment (LGIT)[49] is an attempt to achieve the stable blood glucose levels seen in children on the classic ketogenic diet while using a much less restrictive regimen. The hypothesis is that stable blood glucose may be one of the mechanisms of action involved in the ketogenic diet,[9] which occurs because the absorption of the limited carbohydrates is slowed by the high fat content.[5] Although it is also a high-fat diet (with approximately 60% calories from fat),[5] the LGIT allows more carbohydrate than either the classic ketogenic diet or the modified Atkins diet, approximately 40–60 g per day.[18] However, the types of carbohydrates consumed are restricted to those that have a glycaemic index lower than 50. Like the modified Atkins diet, the LGIT is initiated and maintained at outpatient clinics and does not require precise weighing of food or intensive dietitian support. Both are offered at most centres that run ketogenic diet programmes, and in some centres they are often the primary dietary therapy for adolescents.[9]
The ketogenic diet is an advanced nutritional approach that improves fat burning, preserves lean body tissue and improves brain function. The Ketogenic diet also starves cancer cells of their preferred fuel source (sugar) and allows our immune system to function at it peak. This book goes over all the details and challenges involved with the Ketogenic diet in order to turn your body into a lean, mean fat burning machine. You will find invaluable information in this 10 chapter E-guide that will help you break through challenges you have experienced in the past with the ketogenic diet.
Recently, many of my patients have been asking about a ketogenic diet. Is a ketogenic diet safe? Would you recommend it? Despite the recent hype, a ketogenic diet is not something new. In medicine, we have been using it for almost 100 years to treat drug-resistant epilepsy, especially in children. In the 1970s, Dr. Atkins popularized his very-low-carbohydrate diet for weight loss that began with a very strict two-week ketogenic phase. Over the years, other fad diets incorporated a similar approach for weight loss.
During the 1920s and 1930s, when the only anticonvulsant drugs were the sedative bromides (discovered 1857) and phenobarbital (1912), the ketogenic diet was widely used and studied. This changed in 1938 when H. Houston Merritt, Jr. and Tracy Putnam discovered phenytoin (Dilantin), and the focus of research shifted to discovering new drugs. With the introduction of sodium valproate in the 1970s, drugs were available to neurologists that were effective across a broad range of epileptic syndromes and seizure types. The use of the ketogenic diet, by this time restricted to difficult cases such as Lennox–Gastaut syndrome, declined further.[10]
For patients who benefit, half achieve a seizure reduction within five days (if the diet starts with an initial fast of one to two days), three-quarters achieve a reduction within two weeks, and 90% achieve a reduction within 23 days. If the diet does not begin with a fast, the time for half of the patients to achieve an improvement is longer (two weeks), but the long-term seizure reduction rates are unaffected.[44] Parents are encouraged to persist with the diet for at least three months before any final consideration is made regarding efficacy.[9]
Some sugar-free candy may seem safe (especially on dirty keto), but can contain the wrong sugar alcohols that could spike your blood glucose. This recipe uses stevia, which ranks much lower on the glycemic index, combined with lemon juice and gelatin for a chewy 3-ingredient gummy candy that still satisfies your sugar cravings. Make sure your gelatin comes from a pastured source to keep this one Bulletproof.

Ketoacidosis, on the other hand, is dangerous. But it’s usually limited to people with type 1 diabetes, striking when their glucose levels rise due to illness or a missed insulin dose. Without insulin, cells can’t take in glucose, so they burn fat for fuel instead, producing exceptionally high ketone levels—much higher than the amount generated by the keto diet. That, in combination with high blood glucose levels, essentially poisons the blood. “It’s very easy to tell the difference between nutritional ketosis, which has no negative symptoms [aside from ‘keto breath,’ which can smell like nail polish remover], and dietary ketoacidosis, which is an illness that requires hospitalization and causes lethargy, abdominal pain, nausea, vomiting, rapid breathing, and lack of appetite,” says William Yancy, MD, program director at the Duke Diet and Fitness Center in Durham, North Carolina.

As discussed in the first article of this series, ketosis is a metabolic state in which the brain switches to using ketone bodies – derived from the breakdown of fat – as its primary energy source, instead of glucose. This way body protein, which would otherwise be broken down and converted into glucose through the process of gluconeogenesis, are spared.
I actually clicked on the story just to see if they included anything about it’s use in managing chronic migraine. I have chronic migraine, basically intractable. Nothing has helped. I’ve tried medications, meditations, and everything in between including a bunch of dietary changes. Keto is my next consideration. I’m happy to hear it helped you! Thanks for sharing
Children who discontinue the diet after achieving seizure freedom have about a 20% risk of seizures returning. The length of time until recurrence is highly variable, but averages two years. This risk of recurrence compares with 10% for resective surgery (where part of the brain is removed) and 30–50% for anticonvulsant therapy. Of those who have a recurrence, just over half can regain freedom from seizures either with anticonvulsants or by returning to the ketogenic diet. Recurrence is more likely if, despite seizure freedom, an electroencephalogram shows epileptiform spikes, which indicate epileptic activity in the brain but are below the level that will cause a seizure. Recurrence is also likely if an MRI scan shows focal abnormalities (for example, as in children with tuberous sclerosis). Such children may remain on the diet longer than average, and children with tuberous sclerosis who achieve seizure freedom could remain on the ketogenic diet indefinitely.[46]
^ Ketogenic "eggnog" is used during induction and is a drink with the required ketogenic ratio. For example, a 4:1 ratio eggnog would contain 60 g of 36% heavy whipping cream, 25 g pasteurised raw egg, saccharin and vanilla flavour. This contains 245 kcal (1,025 kJ), 4 g protein, 2 g carbohydrate and 24 g fat (24:6 = 4:1).[17] The eggnog may also be cooked to make a custard, or frozen to make ice cream.[37]
The classic ketogenic diet is not a balanced diet and only contains tiny portions of fresh fruit and vegetables, fortified cereals, and calcium-rich foods. In particular, the B vitamins, calcium, and vitamin D must be artificially supplemented. This is achieved by taking two sugar-free supplements designed for the patient's age: a multivitamin with minerals and calcium with vitamin D.[18] A typical day of food for a child on a 4:1 ratio, 1,500 kcal (6,300 kJ) ketogenic diet comprises three small meals and three small snacks:[28]
Here are a few of the most common side effects that I come across when people first start keto. Frequently the issues relate to dehydration or lack of micronutrients (vitamins) in the body. Make sure that you’re drinking enough water (close to a gallon a day) and eating foods with good sources of micronutrients. To read more on micronutrients, click here >
If you’ve decided to move forward in trying the keto diet, you will want to stick to the parameters of the eating plan. Roughly 60 to 80 percent of your calories will come from fats. That means you’ll eat meats, fats, and oils, and a very limited amount of nonstarchy vegetables, she says. (This is different from a traditional low-carb diet, as even fewer carbs are allowed on the keto diet.)